THE MINERAL BARITE

Barite is a common mineral and makes very attractive specimens.
It often is an accessory mineral to other minerals and can make a nice backdrop to brightly colored crystals.
At times bladed or tabular crystals of Barite form a concentric pattern of increasingly larger crystals outward.
This has the appearance of a flower and when colored red by iron stains, these formations are called "Desert Roses".

Because Barite is so common, it can be confused for other minerals. Celestite (SrSO4) has the same structure
as barite and forms very similar crystals.
The two are indistinguishable by ordinary methods, but a flame test can distinguish them.
By scraping the dust of the crystals into a gas flame the color of the flame will confirm the identity of the crystal.
If the flame is a pale green it is barite, but if the flame is red it is celestite.
The flame test works because the elements barium (Ba) and strontium (Sr) react in the flame and produce those colors.

PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS:

Color is variable but is commonly found colorless or white, also blue, green, yellow and red shades.

Luster is vitreous.

Transparency crystals are transparent to translucent.

Crystal System is orthorhombic; 2/m 2/m 2/m

Crystal Habits include the bladed crystals that are dominated by two large pinacoid faces top and bottom
and small prism faces forming a jutting angle on every side.
There are many variations of these faces but the flattened blades and tabular crystals are the most common.
If the pinacoid faces become diminished or are absent, the resulting prismatic crystal has a rhombic cross section.
Also scaly, lamellar, and even fiberous.

Cleavage is perfect in one direction, less so in another direction.

Fracture is conchoidal.

Hardness is 3 - 3.5

Specific Gravity is approximately 4.5 (heavy for translucent minerals)

This is another good specimen of pale gold barite crystals. Many of the crystals show good transparency and luster, but many others have a rough surface texture that mars their clarity. Unfortunately the largest crystals show the most damage

A cluster of golden barite crystals are perched on what's left of a plate of some black mineral. The rhombic blades of barite are generally good with only minor damage, and there is a noticeable difference in the crystal quality from one side to the other.

This specimen is dominated by what's left of a single large barite crystal. It shows a gray phantom over a pale-gray golden crystal, and one side is partly coated with an acculumation of tiny black sparkly crystals (sand).

This is an very nice barite specimen. It consists of several intergrown crystals in nearly perfect alignment, partly coated on one side with a druze of black sparkly crystals that I first thought was quartz, but under a loupe it looks like more barite, colored black by an unknown mineral. This specimen presents nicely. Reflections reveal interesting growth patterns on the faces of the crystals.

These barite crystals are "smoky phantoms" in the sense that they appear to have an outer layer of gray barite over an inner pale green core. The luster is generally dulled, and the top side of the crystals hold mounds of tiny black crystals as though black sand was poured over the crystals and was then fixed in place.